How to Make a Hydromel (Low ABV Mead)
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 9 июл 2024
- Today we're going to make a hydromel! This is a low ABV mead that is pretty easy and cheap to make. These meads make great gifts and taste great for any season of life. This mead is going to be carbonated which is really nice. You can do this with other kinds of honey, fruits or really any other flavor.
I ended up adding some acid blend to help balance out this mead. You don't have to do this but I would suggest adding something like that to help balance the acidity of your mead (generally these low abv meads need that kind of help).
Let me know what you think below and thanks for watching!
Here's the recipe for this mead:
7/8 Gallon of Spring Water
1.3 Pounds of Honey
2 Grams of Lalvin D47
Starting Gravity: 1.048 = 6.3% ABV
Join this channel to get access to perks:
/ @manmademead
Want to know what I use?
Check it out on my Amazon store of my website!
www.ManMadeMead.com
Want to support the channel?
Check out the Patreon! www.Patreon.com/ManMadeMead
Discord Link: discord.io/ManMadeMead
www.Facebook.com/ManMadeMeadery 
Хобби
glad to have you back MMM!!!
Love the Cow Chop cup!
Thanks for showing that you can bottle condition a hydromel for a quick turn around, too. Love it!
Love this channel. BTW, change playback speed to .5 and you seem hammered while instructing!
😂 you’re right!
Thats hilarious!!!! It really does
He's like that drunk friend who trys to act sober. Lol. I'm so glad I saw this comment 😭
I'm still laughing my ass off. Epic find, comment!!!
I dont mean to be so offtopic but does any of you know of a method to log back into an instagram account??
I somehow lost my password. I appreciate any help you can give me!
I love the video! thank you!
I love when you go "If you're mad, sorry"
:)
Thanks for this simple recipe. It brought back memories of a cider my grandparents used to make called honeysuckle cider.
I had forgotten about it until you mentioned the flowery taste. That's what I would get from her mix. Kinda fresh, not sweet but bright taste with no bite to it. She would serve a small glass before dinner as an appetizer.
Happy holidays and looking forward to catching you in the new year 🥳👍❤️🙏
I’m excited to try a hydrogel cause I’ve only done high ABV mead which is amazing but I want some quick turn around mead I think I’ll hop as well why not thank you for your content
I made Doin the Most’s lemon drop hydromel. It’s fantastic. Watched this video and his again in preparation to experiment with a peach version.
I do enjoy all the measurements and math that go into homebrewing, but like you i don't go to the far right of the decimal haha. Its fun to know what your making but that feels like work and im trying to have fun. Just made a 5 gallon batch of 7% hydromel today. I plan on seperating it into 1 gallon carboys; sorbating and backsweetening with different fruits for a month. Strawberry and blueberry are house favorites.
I just finished a dry mead and this video helped me save it. I ordered some acid blend and now understand why you generally add the black tea to your recipes. Thanks!
I love it! Im glad I could help!
Yeah definitely agree with the body lacking statement when I made a similar recipe. The acid blend seems good. I would add low amount of wine tannin to help fill it out a bit. Also I don't know how you feel about stabilizers but to get that honey taste, stabilizer the brew, back sweeten with honey and force carb. I don't even keg to force carb. I just use a special adapter for my small co2 tank and carb in 2 liter bottles.
omg so sry for not keeping u in the loop i am soon done with this semester and in december we are tasting our apple/cinnamon and blue berry mead
Hey Triple M! Just started two 1 gallon carboys of hydromel using this video as a guide 😀 Thanks for making this content! It really helped me get started with this hobby and I'm really enjoying it so far. I hope the hydromels will be good for the summer weeks here in Ireland...if we ever get them this year haha. Please keep it up 👍
I’m super happy to help! Let me know if there is ever anything I can do!
it's interesting you have differentiation between mead and hydromel. In France we don't have such with low/mid/high ABV. Interestingly the french wikipedia hydromel page states that hydromel (as in french) is between 10% and 18% ABV.
been watching your channel for the past few weeks, just getting into mead making myself. Nice to know you're in Oklahoma! There's another channel that does a lot of Mead and sounds like he's in Atoka. I'm an Okie too so was surprised to see that two of the youtube channels I've been consistently seeing are from here. Very nice!
You're thinking of Doin the Most! He's here in OKC with me!
@@ManMadeMead Haha yup that's the one! Since making this comment, I went down the rabbithole on both channels, saw you guys have done several collabs. Very cool! So is this just a popular hobby in this area? (I'm in Yukon). Or just a coincidence?
Great stuff! I'm trying to make a hydromel right now, but fermentation seem to have stuck. D-47 and a very cheap honey, and with fluctuating temperature (between 14-20c) seem to have been to much for the hydromel, so I tried fixing it with some leftover Voss Gjernes Kveik. We'll see if it makes something drinkable!
Awesome CowChop glass
Rip
Do you think this would work with dry hopping or using hop-bittered (then cooled) water for the must - essentially treating it as a wort (without boiling the honey)?
I enjoy a carbonated mead. I keep mead in the kegerator for co2, I haven't bottle carbonated yet.
In France hydromel is used for all kind of mead. I m curious to know why it is like that in the US. Nice video!
Quick question: You didn't use any stabilizers. Is this because you brought the brew to 1.0 FG therefore all sugars were used. Then only added enough sugar to lightly carbonate the bottle. Therefore, the risk of bottle bombs is minimal? What about possible contamination?
I am looking to make dry meads and Kiljus for base to mix drinks with. The internet "pros" always seem to say to stabilize but stabilizing doesn't seem to be necessary for dry brews. Or in this case lightly sugar carbonated at the bottling step.
Just started a hydromel 4 days ago! Would it negatively affect the fermentation process if I added a fining agent prior to wracking?
Mans has a cow chop glass
China brewers here! Thanks for your vids, I’ve learned a lot. This season trying your recipe for this hydromel, but now for 5 gallons.
Question; why do you go by weight of your honey & not by volume
From my beer brewing experience I prime with syrup (just add enough water to dissolve your priming sugar and heat it up) it dissolve really fast and you just have to mix it gently, no aeration issues !
I know that mead is a lot more stable in term of aeration and I don’t care like I do with beer, but I find this method Easter that way anyway!
Cheers
Léo
Need to talk more about yeast temperatures when you use a certain yeast. Fusel production on D47 is crazy and won't mellow out of such a young mead.
Could I add lime or lemon juice or zest instead of the acid blend? I want to have a fizzy summer drink. Like a mojito but with fizz.
Yes you can!
Awesome vid. Any advice on incorporating grape juice into this?
You could start with half grape juice and half water as your base and then add about 1 pound of honey per gallon!
@@ManMadeMead Thanks broski, appreciate the input!
Hey man, heard about the ice storm, hope you came out of it alright, what with the power loss and all that. Experience any trouble with your fermentations?
Stuff stopped fermenting for about a week, but it’s resumed!
How would you backsweeten (with honey) a hydromel without having the honey fermented and still add priming sugar and CO2. Because I want to try making a carbonated hydromel with some sweetness from the honey. Any suggestions? Thanks again!
Perhaps overprime the bottles with honey and then pasteurize after a few days once the bottles have sufficient carbonation pressure using a plastic bottle to gauge carbonation. When I say pasteurize I mean heat them to kill the yeast so sitting them in a bath of 40 degrees C water might work?
so you add about 1oz of sugar per 1 gallon for natural carbonation?
It depends on what kind of sugar you are using as the priming sugar. Use this calculator to figure it out: www.northernbrewer.com/pages/priming-sugar-calculator?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiA7t6sBhAiEiwAsaieYofyQ62Bf9M2vAKHQyXB-BVb8wLVrpYGOnt-jMf-0MFebeHOi9e0FBoC7ecQAvD_BwE
What type of pH tester did the Vikings use?
None! But they also only lived to be like 40 - 45 years old. So I don't really believe they had it all figured out haha
i usually bottle mine once it gets to like 1.020 so the residual sugars can carbonate it. carbonates in 3 days. definitely not the proper way to do it if you’re selling it lol but it’s just one less step 😭 anyways! i appreciate your videos. there aren’t many mead making youtubers out there!
Oh man! Be careful with that, you don’t want to go too crazy with the carbonation. If you’ve got it down to a science though, then you’re good. Thanks for watching my stuff!
@@ManMadeMead truee, i have had overly carbonated hydromels and i have to swirl it in the glass to release some of it 😅 it usually gets drank before it has too much time getting too carbonated in the fridge. still getting the science down.
@@ManMadeMead Its not science, its art.
After the 8 days primary fermentation do you go through a secondary fermentation or did you just bottled right after?
I just bottled it in this case because I added all the things to alter the acid balance, sweetness level and priming sugar!
Do I need a special hydrometer? I can never get an accurate reading because my OG is off the charts for mine
You shouldn’t need a special hydrometer reading. Most hydrometers stop at 1.160 (which would be over a 20% mead). It sounds like you need to use less sugar in your starting brew!
How do you make your* labels Mr.MMM?
By adding an acidic fruit would be the same as adding the acid blend u used, correct?
Possibly! It depends on how much you add!
Do you have to store the bottles in a cool space or fridge?
Most of mine are stored at room temp in boxes!
With many meads do you find you add acid blend for mouthfeel? I find compared to apple cider meads lack tannin and acid. Some hydromels just lack that mouthfeel.
I definitely think meads like this need some acid help. So I've started to use acid blend or lemon juice to add a slight bite to help it out!
Do you still use your aeration pump on your meads any more? Do you think aeration actually makes a big difference for mead?
I honestly don't use it much. I haven't done a side by side test of a mead with and without it, so it's hard to say if it really does that much. I might do that in the future!
Love your stuff... can you make a video on cleaning those glass cayboys?
He has a video on that already, it’s one of the first ones I think 👍🏼
Use hot water and soak it in PBW or Oxyclean for an hour, flip it over with the cleaner inside for another hour or so and then rinse it thoroughly. Should do the trick.
Go to amazon and buy tiny stainless steel bb’s. Then fill 1/3 of container with water/star san. Poor in the bb’s and shake in a rolling motion. Imagine your exercising with Richard Simmons for 5 minutes. Take a breath in celebration. Then put mesh bag over the end to catch bb’s. Rinse container and let dry.
@@1014p ooh that’s a good one!
number one thing about it is, after racking something DO NOT let the carboy dry, I made that mistake and it sucked! better you rinse right away with water a couple times then do above stuff.
Hi! As I told you before I made my batch but I have a problem. It's fermenting the same as the beginning. I started it on march 7 and, up today, it did not even slow down a little bit. Any idea of what's going on in there? I don't have to tell how much I apreciate your help, videos and tips. Thanks a lot and keep it up!!!!
It sounds like your brew is fermenting well if the fermentation hasn't stopped!
We'll see what happens. Thanks a lot
Where do you get your labels made?
Here’s a video where I talk about my labels! ruclips.net/video/OUEKMnNufF8/видео.html
Why not use lower abv resistance yeasts - Using it's limit to maintain a residual sweetness and therefore a stronger body presence as well as mouth feel. I really liked the acid blend touch for a quick fermentation and less complex honey wine, that builds up it's playfulness and may boost the flavor. Keep on brewing my friend!
Two problems with this.
1: There are no yeast that I know of that will reliably ferment under 10% ABV.
2: If you hit the tolerance of your yeast, then you can no longer bottle carbonate. The only way to do so would be to add a stronger yeast, but that would also eat an residual sugars, still leaving you with a dry mead. This is also very unsafe, as you would likely create bottle bombs.
@@Vykk_Draygo could just make a 10% batch then dilute it down. Make more product with same effect.
@@1014p As soon as you dilute it, the yeast will reactivate and consume the sugars, as you've lowered the ABV. Aside from that, I would personally never dilute a mead with water, as you're just losing flavor. But I'm also the guy that will drink uncut whiskey at over 60% ABV. YMMV.
@@Vykk_Draygo well doing a 5% brew is the same as doing a 10% version. Difference is one is effectively concentrated. Diluting it down should have same or better flavor. Yes yeast could reactivate. If your doing something like this likely you would homogenize the brew to kill yeast.
what did you use for your priming sugar? thanks!
Just standard store bought priming sugar in this case!
@@ManMadeMead thanks. How long can I leave a mead at it's final gravity before all the yeast die? e.g. if I measure 1.010, wait a week and measure 1.010 again, I know it's done fermenting but would the yeast have died during that week? meaning that adding sugar for carbonation wouldnt work? Or are yeast pretty hardy and can wait that long without sugar?
Is it ok to start brewing in a container sanitized with starsan when it isnt dry? Won't that kill your yeast or give an off taste? I always makes sure my equipment is completely dry after sanitizing, is that a mistake?
It's brew safe so you don't have to worry about it messing with your brew! The yeast you use to brew won't be affected by the StarSan.
@@ManMadeMead well that will speed things up, I just stare at my brew buckets longingly as they dry because I have all the ingredients for the next batch.
What drill attachment is he using?
This is the one I like! amzn.to/4389631
@@ManMadeMeadLegend! thank you for the reply.
Just started brewing the other month and after seeing you using that Knew I needed one in my setup.
12:10 at .5 playback speed.
Hey there new subscriber here, just got alot of my mead making items in from the mail, I have binged all of your videos but I am still undecided on what two things to make first I have 2 one gallon carboys. Help!
Hey! I would definitely make a traditional mead and the maybe a melomel (fruit mead). Traditional recipe: 3/4 gallon of water, 3 pounds of honey and some wine yeast (I like the Lalvin QA23 alot). The fruit mead can be any fruit you want. You will make a traditional mead for that one and then add a couple pounds of your fruit to the mead after it has finished it’s main fermentation!
@@ManMadeMead thanks alot! Traditional it is! I bought some d47 and ec118 based on some of your other videos will they work well for a traditional mead? Also what is your opinion of jaom?
@@danielvalencia6582 Both of those work really well for traditional meads! I actually prefer the EC-1118 over the D47 in that case.
You didn't add any kind of yeast nutrients? I'm going to make a batch right away. Thanks for the recipe
It's nice to add a little bit in hydromels!
@@ManMadeMead thanks a lot
No yeast nutrient?
I didn't in this case but I would highly recommend you use some nutrient for sure!
My hydromels have always tasted very...thin. Maybe that’s the nature of a hydromels, but I recall having store-bought hydromels that had more body and mouth feel. Any recommendations?
Carbonation and acidity will help with the mouthfeel
Backsweetening, acid adjustment, and tannin. Powdered wine tannins are the easiest way to adjust tannin in hydromels. As far as acids, you can get citric acid, malic acid, and tartaric acid in bulk. There are also blends available. Carbonation helps with mouthfeel as well.
I always make hydromels with a bit of brewed black tea or a tisane made with bitter herbs (a tiny bit of wormwood, angelica, gentian and/or cinchona bark). Technically this makes it a metheglin but I rarely go heavy enough with the herbs to take it into metheglin territory, IMO; I'm simply using them for a bit of tannin. Personally, with meads, I don't mess with acid blends or commercial acids all that often (though I do keep citric acid and malic acid in the house for use in cocktail experiments). I find a 1/2oz of freshly squeezed lemon juice (per gallon) added in primary does wonders for a hydromel. For me it's that simple. I agree with other commenters about carbonation; I find it's a must for a hydromel. I like session meads that drink like beers. I never backsweeten/add sulfites or sorbates. But I'll often use a smidgen of molasses in the brew. Molasses is not fully fermentable and will leave just a tiiiiiny bit of residual sugar as well as help with mouthfeel. I usually produce them in a pet nat style by taking frequent gravity readings and bottling between 1.002 and 1.005. The pet nat style of carbonation is faaaar superior to me when compared to priming bottles with dextrose or sucrose. I let the mead go dry in the bottle. Obviously, I wouldn't try this technique without an accurate hydrometer and bottles I knew were structurally sound.
add a cup of strong black tea to your must and it will get more mouth-feel
Probably used tea or similar item to impart tannins. Small amounts of fruit or raising maybe.
7/8 of a gallon?? 😆 Can you guys go metric already please?
he's a brother okie
My friend, here in Brazil, (and maybe all portuguese and spanish countries) all meads are called hidromel... Never found any other name
In general, hydromels are only low alcohol meads. Most meads are higher alcohol, closer to wine (12-14%).
@@TheMukster sure, but as I said before, the name here, in Brazil, is hidromel for all the beverages made from honey. "mead" has no other translation unfortunately. Try using Google Translator, you will see.
That makes sense, because hydromel just means water honey. The only reason modern meadmakers use that word is to differentiate it from wine strength meads, so it's a more "watery mead". The word "mead" in English is derived from the word for honey in proto-Indo European, just as "mel" is.
"it's a little flat, I think carbonation will help with that" lol ya think.
Yup!
Can you not prime with honey? Just wondering ...
You can! You just want to make sure that you use the correct amount!
Just 1.3 pounds for 8 gallons? Damn, that's really less. I was trying out Groennfell's recipe - they use about a pound (or pound and half) per gallon - and finished with a 7% abv. Are you sure of using just 1.3 pounds?
It's less than a gallon, not 8 gallons. Not sure where you got that from.
7/8th of a gallon, as in .875 of a gallon.
Wait...3/4 pound, or 1.3 pounds. I usually just listen to your videos while I'm doing other things, but happened to be watching this one. It would be really helpful if the words and the text matched.
3300 water on 590 honey, if you belong to the 99% of the world who uses real measurements.
Or 5 and a half Liters of water on 1 Liter of Honey, which is a lot, considering most people here on RUclips say 3 Liters or 4 Liters of Water per 1 Honey
just being a hydromel does not make it a low abv mead, yo.
You're right! In america (and seemingly a lot of the online mead making places) most people call low ABV meads hydromels.
@@ManMadeMead I've literally never heard that. Never.
@@felixinkorea7164 Technically "hydromel" is an old term for mead in general, but these days its english use generally refers to a mead of less than 8-9% ABV. So if you were to enter a competition with your meads, those would be entered as hydromels